Questions

Questions

Daniel 13:1-9; 15-17; 19-30, 33-62; John 8:1-11

"Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone."

Yesterday as I was coming back from the Opera Plaza on Van Ness, someone called my name, and I turned around and in a wheel chair was a young man of 30. I have know James since he was 15, when he ran away from home and began hustling. James is a young man who is gay, and was not welcome at home, and was questioning. He disappeared from Polk several years ago.

James shared that he was in a car accident up north in 2015 and was parallelized from the waste down and was now living in a group home in the East Bay. We talked of his faith, his struggles. He shared of how his fundamentalist friends disowned him once he shared he was gay, and he asked me "Am I really going to hell?" I looked deep into his eyes and said "Never, God loves you, and God has redeemed you in Christ, you are loved." I anointed him, and pronounced a benediction. He hugged me. James has been broken by people judging him because of his sexuality. Judged in the name of the Christ who cares not about sexual orientation--only that we love God and our neighbor. Christ is blind to all things accept our common humanity.

Like the Pharisees in our story we Christians hurt so many people, we bring them so much pain, rather than offering them the love of Christ, we offer them our own questions, our own doubts. This Lent let us remember that God is love, and that on the cross Christ opened his arms in love, without judgment to all of us. Let us remember the words of Jesus:

"Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone."

Deo Gratias! Thanks be to God!

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Fr. C. River Damien Sims, sfw, D.Min. candidate, D.S.T.

P.O. Box 642656

San Francisco, CA 94164

www.temenos.org

415-305-2124